Millions of people worldwide are lining up to stare into a silver sphere about the size of a bowling ball so their irises can be scanned in exchange for online identity verification and “free” cryptocurrency.
The silver spheres, known as “Orbs”, are part of the Worldcoin platform, which officially launched in July 2023 after an 18-month testing phase. Led by Sam Altman (chief executive of OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT) and entrepreneur Alex Blania, Worldcoin offers users a “digital passport” known as World ID and small allocations of a cryptocurrency token also called Worldcoin (WLD), “simply for being human”.
